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I tried it on PC some years ago, back when CGW gave away the full game on one of its CDs, and my experience was pretty much this:

Build up my dudes, start some research, shoot down a UFO, awwww yeah, visit the crash site, OMG all my dudes are dead.

I decided that it either just wasn't for me or that I didn't have the time to put into learning how to not my ass kicked instantaneously.

But I kept hearing all these rapturous stories about it, so I scavenged up an old PS1 copy and ripped it to my PSP. Unsurprisingly, my experience on the PSP was almost exactly the same.

This game is obtuse in a way that is simultaneously infuriating and strangely compelling. I want it to yield its secrets to me, but I have no idea how to proceed. It's like a relationship, for crying out loud! So this is my dating angst thread, but for X-Com. Please, help me to love this game the way you guys love it.

Well here is me:
The game always puts Tamren in the second row to get off the skyranger. Behind Tomayto and Davet and the tank. Out of all of our soldiers Tamren has by far the highest amount of Time Units and probably the highest strength as well.

This is Prozac:
His stats are actually not that spectacular. I think its probably because he does a lot of long range sniping. So he doesn't run around a whole lot and rarely gets reaction fire attacks. He just has something lucky about him. Well call it plot armour and leave it at that.

Every single one of our soldiers has really high stamina and strength because I always load them down with tons of gear. Tamren and Prozac as squad leaders tend to leave the skyranger with completely full belts and maybe one or two spaces left in the backpack.

Out of all of us the most badass soldier stat wise is probably Nevin. I keep forgetting to rename him a Heavy.

Stamina and Time Units increase from experience, as does health. Reactions only increases when you attack aliens on their turn. Firing accuracy improves with practice, whether or not you hit anything. And strength increases when you run around encumbered with a lot of gear, which is all the time. Strength is mostly used to determine how far you can throw something. The heaviest ordnance we have are detpacks and Tamren can easily lob one about as far as a rookie can throw a regular grenade. Throwing accuracy is essentially meaningless, except in very rare circumstances such as throwing through a window.

By far the most valuable stat is Psi strength which we can't see yet. And bravery because it very very rarely increases and only (I think) if you get wounded. This is why I reject all soldiers with 20 or less. Normally I would reject 30 or less, but I expect a lot of attrition.

Our scientists did some more work and we now have the tech to build hyper wave decoders, rendering current radar systems obsolete. Unfortunately each one costs a sh*tton at $1.4 million. If you combine the loss of US funding as well as the large network of bases and interceptors we have going, the maintenance costs just don't add up. This means we will have to board and recover every single UFO we can get our hands on.

This isn't really a *problem* but I'm a bit worried that these missions will become boring. You see we are essentially hard bitten veterans at this point. Anyone who survives 10 missions or more is a certified badass by XCOM standards. This is why we regularly clear missions with no casualties. And this exactly what we should be doing, building up a large cadre of experienced veterans. However we will need far more than 2 squads of 5 and a tank for the truly tough missions. And given that we have yet to meet aliens other than sectoids or floaters, we have to account for future attrition. The cryssalid apocalypse is just around the corner.

To that end I am placing most of our veterans in reserve. Future missions, unless we tackle a battleship or base will be composed of rookies and a few veterans to show them the ropes. We will want to end up with about 30 members.

I currently have more recruits on the way. So until they arrive we have 2 UFOs to clean up. With Prozac out of action Tanglebones finally has a chance to take up a heavy laser and join the team as sniper. In addition for this mission we will be swapping out Devil for Nihilo because our spiffy new laser tank just rolled out of the workshop and needs breaking in.

Mission begins. Its night, and we are just across the border from Ottowa in hilly a forested area. Nihilo rolls of the ramp and *SKPEW* takes a plasma hit to the front armour! The tank is hurt but survives. Spinning the turret around Nihilo blasts the floater down with a direct hit to centre mass. Clearing the ramp for the rest of the team he spots another floater in the darkness. Tomayto, first off the ramp hops off the side and fires on the floater. He can't aim too well at night apparently because he sprays lazer all over the side of the UFO before finally hitting with his 6th shot. Floater down. Davet and Tamren hop off and pop flares.

New turn. No new sightings, we spread out. The supply transport UFO is right in front of us. Seems intact from the outside. With the door so close I send all nearby members to breach while a small group moves uphill to the east with nihilo. There are so many trees around its hard to see past 10 feet.

New turn. We take plasma fire but can't tell where it comes from. Falchion is first through the door. The whole inside of the UFO is a mess and filled with smoke. Moving inside he spots a floater and guns it down. The rest move inside and take positions around a lift. Outside Tamren spots a floater in the darkness and takes it out with a laser to the head. Tanglebones throws a flare to reveal another floater, but misses the shot. No one else has line of sight.

New turn. The floater aims and attacks Nihilo! Nihilo is hit! Thankfully this time the armour holds and he is unhurt. His first shot vapourizes a small tree, but the second hits the floater dead centre. Another kill for Nihilo. Back in the UFO Tanglebone breaches the second door and comes face to face with a floater. Obscured by smoke the floater can't see him, and with a single shot Tanglebones gets his first kill! Falchion and Edosan climb the first lift, but find no floaters. Milkman rides the second up and... *BLAM* Plasma fire dents the ground inches away from his feet! He turns around to find a floater RIGHT BEHIND HIM. After sh*tting a brick he blasts the alien on full auto, taking him out with the second shot. Phew...

New turn. Suddenly the door opens beside Milkman and a floater emerges. But standing beside the door Milkman is out of sight and the floater turns and exits! Before the floater can do anything more Milkman leans around the doorway and shoots him in the back! Edosan and Bighoppa join him on the second level. Bighoppa steps out the door and *BOOM*. A stun ball comes out of nowhere and knocks him out cold! Milkman is down as well! Edosan, shielded from the blast is unaffected, grabbing Milkman's stun rod off the ground he rounds the corner and tazers the floater medic. Level 2 secured.

New turn. Upstairs Edosan Mudbunny and Falchion creep up on the bridge. Clearing one side of the UFO they approach another blind corner and Falchion throws a grenade.

New turn. *Whump* the grenade takes out an unseen floater. They creep closer, revealing the bridge door. Falchion breaches... Falchion is hit! His armour smoking and charred Falchion escapes harm! Returning fire he misses but hits a nearby bridge console! The console explodes and the floater is downed! UFO Secure.

Mission Accomplished. 10 aliens down, 1 captured. Falchion mildly singed and Nihilos tank took a beating. No other injuries. No power core or elerium, but we did salvage the pretty big UFO which helped raise our score of 420.

This mission marks another milestone. Tamren has just been promoted to Colonel and now gets to wear an uncomfortably phallic insignia. This has caused a tier jump in the chain of command. Additional promotions as follows:

If you need a rookie, you can throw me into the mix for the fun of it. I can be the FNG who opens the door or goes around the corner first. That's how I roll.

I bought the whole series in some sale or another back in September, but I've just now started playing the game for the first time so I'm a bit over my head. The graphics fool you into thinking it's a simple game, but it's pretty damn complicated once you get down in there. I built a base, did my first ground mission versus a UFO that had landed on it's own, lost half my team due to stupid stuff (my own fault.. at one point I accidentally ordered one of my soldiers to throw his rifle at an alien. He duitfully carried out this order, unslinging his rifle and hurling it to the feet of some unknown Being, said Being not humored at all at the turn of events and vaporizing my brave (stupid?) soldier), and am now starting a new campaign. Not sure how long I'll stick with it (damn you Steam sale) but it's got my attention for the time being. There seems to be a lull in these types of game recently unless I'm missing out on them. The last I played was Silent Storm and loved, loved, loved it until it went all sci-fi on me. Not that I mind sci-fi (obviously since I'm playing this) but I didn't like the Star Trek mixing with my Saving Private Ryan (if that makes any sense). Anyway, carry on. I've been enjoying the stories Tamren and they've been helping me figure out some of just what I'm supposed to be doing.

Alrighty. It is now the 30th day of the month. The recruits arrived and have been vetted. Out of 20 scrubs 5 were given the boot. Which means operation meatgrinder can begin. We have had no contacts except for a large UFO we were unable to engage. But just before the end of the month a small UFO appeared and was downed over the Russian border. I am taking this opportunity to break in 8 rookies. Tamren and Mudbunny will be along this mission to keep an eye on things. As well as Tanglebones who has already earned his stripes having survived his first mission. We will also be taking Nihilo with us.

As per his request I am creating a special rank for Rat Boy. His role of Commissar means that if any of you happen to fall under alien control, or a civilian is about to be turned into a cryssalid. It will be his job to immediately take them out. The catch, is that he can ONLY use an earth projectile pistol to do this.

Mission begins. We have landed in a nice friendly corner. Moving Nihilo off the ramp reveals probably the best LZ I have ever seen. We are beside 2 wheat fields with a long continuous fence providing us with perfect cover. Tamren is out first and spots the first alien. Its a snakeman. Not having anything better to do he takes a hail mary snap shot with his stun launcher and manages to down the snakeman. The rest of the squad spills out.

New turn. Rolling south Nihilo spots another snakeman. Feeank has a shot and pulls of a perfect double tap to the snakemans head! Well done! Maybe I should have made him a sniper. We advance, but see nothing new.

New turn. A snakeman appears out of an orchard to the south. Kier opens fire with his autocannon, but after 6 shots only manage to blow away an intervening hedge and fence. Vega tries next and gets a direct hit with his heavy cannon. The snakeman is unfazed, shooting back but missing us completely. Finally Quntin crouches down and hits the snakeman in the, uh, leg, with a heavy laser shot. Kill to Quintin! searching the area we find nothing else.

New turn. After forming up the breaching team. The *honor* of breaching the door goes to Vector. He bursts inside and... Snakeman! Vector fires 3 shots. The first is a miss! The second hits, and the third takes down the snakeman! UFO secure.

Mission Accomplished. We lucked out this time and the UFO landed intact. Delicious Elerium! We took out 3 snakemen and Tamren stunned a navigator. Total score 116.

To account for the new influx of soldiers Tamren has been promoted yet again to Commander. In his place Nevin has become a Colonel and Davet a Captain.

A couple hours later the month has ended. Our score is an amazing 3566. Our funding has increased by 762k. Which is less than last time, those cheap jerks.

We now have stun launchers, rendering the old tazer prods obsolete. Even better we now have power armour! Because of the limited supply of elerium not everyone will be getting a suit, for now only the assaults.

As per his request I am creating a special rank for Rat Boy. His role of Commissar means that if any of you happen to fall under alien control, or a civilian is about to be turned into a cryssalid. It will be his job to immediately take them out. The catch, is that he can ONLY use an earth projectile pistol to do this.

Oooo, I hope it's a Colt Single Action Army. Might as well execute them with a classic.

*Legion* wrote:

my right hand spent most of those early-teen years in that grip position... damn near wore out my Thrustmaster...

The highlight of the mission however is this AMAZING shot by Rat Boy. By crouching on a hay bale he manages to spot the alien through two windows. From this angle he can only see half of the snakeman, but still manages to nail him in the shoulder, taking him out in one hit. Drinks on me.

All thanks to those fine pistol skills I've been honing in Red Dead Redemption. Seriously; didn't even need Dead Eye to take out the hostage takers or that angry farmer's flying hat.

*Legion* wrote:

my right hand spent most of those early-teen years in that grip position... damn near wore out my Thrustmaster...

According to the clock today is Tuesday the 1st of June. XCOM has been in operation for exactly 6 months. I really expected snakemen to show up sooner. We have already tackled a landed battleship and not one but two alien bases. Anyhow it does indicate that things will be getting a lot more dangerous from here on.

Before the first day is over we shoot down a small UFO near Shanghai. I only put the order in for power armour yesterday so its not ready yet.

The mission was so short and routine I won't bother posting it. The UFO was completely trashed on landing, and we only salvaged some 8 units of metal. Tamren breached with his stun launcher in hand in case we wanted to catch anyone inside the UFO. But the snakeman inside turned out to be a soldier. So he stepped aside and Quintin shot him in the foot, this wasn't enough to put it down completely so we now have a snakeman soldier sitting in the slammer.

The highlight of the mission however is this AMAZING shot by Rat Boy. By crouching on a hay bale he manages to spot the alien through two windows. From this angle he can only see half of the snakeman, but still manages to nail him in the shoulder, taking him out in one hit. Drinks on me.

A couple days later on the 4th. HQ radar detects a terror ship to the north and we shoot it down. Mudbunny reached the 10 mission veteran mark, so Khoram will be taking his place. We now have 3 suits of power armour distributed among the squad.

Mission begins. Nihilo rolls of the ramp and before he can even get 5 feet plasma fire splashes against his side armour! Luckily the laser tank is a tough beast and shrugs off the hits, taking massive damage in the process. Rolling further on he spots a sectoid off the ramp to the right! A stone fence blocks his shot, so the first man off the bird, Vega, slides off the ramp and fires a shot from his heavy cannon. Miss. Tamren is up next and easily hits the sectoid in the face with a stun ball. But its still up! Nihilo rolls south and rounds the corner of the fence. He shoots, but misses the sectoid by inches. Finally Khoram clanks down the ramp in his power armour and melts the sectoids face with a heavy plasma blast. Turning around... he spots another sectoid on the other side! Luckily for us this one has its back turned. Tangle bones clanks down the ramp and snipes the alien in the back. Clean kill.

New turn. No contacts. The rest of team Mead Grinder hops off the bird and fans out. Khoram and Tanglebones lead another 3 members south to follow Nihilo to the UFO. The rest follow Tamren east to sweep a couple orchards in search of aliens.

New turn. Plasma fire! An alien appears around the UFO hull and fires on Nihilo, but the aim is high and the bolts streak over the turret. Up north two sectoids appear from an orchard. The first misses but the second shoots Tamren in the head! Thankfully his spiffy new power armour takes the hit without even a scratch! Sweet. The first to open fire is Vega back at the landing gear. His first shot almost makes it, but hits an apple tree short of the target. His second shot is worse and hits a nearby fence, filling Quintin's ass with splinters and shrapnel, whups. Quintin takes this in stride and finishes Vegas job for him by sniping the alien in the chest. The rest of squad 1 takes cover behind a fence.

Down south. Nihilo rolls forward and turns to spot two sectoids facing him down in front of the UFOs door. Taking aim he blasts down the first who carries a heavy plasma. The rest of the squad moves to support but they cant get a shot. So Tanglebones throws a grenade, but it falls short, landing around the corner.

New turn. The grenade goes off to no effect and the sectoid shoots a single shot at Nihilo. The shot spatters off the front armour and doesn't penetrate. So the sectoid retreats inside the UFO. Moving east Tamren and squad 1 find no futher aliens and advance to the west door. Down south Khoram moves up to the UFO corner beside the door and the rest line up behind him.

New turn. That same sectoid pops his head out to shoot at Nihilo again, but the armour holds. Khoram rounds the corner and guns down the alien. The rest of the squad forms up to breach.

New turn. Khoram breaches the door. The inside of the UFO is a mess, but through the haze and smoke he spots a duo of cyberdisks at the far end. Tamren breaches the other door and backstabs both disks with a stun ball. They both drop to the floor. Khorams moves forward to the lift. Tanglebones moves to follow but spots a cyberdisk on the level above! Throwing a det pack he dives for cover.

New turn. *KABOOM* The cyberdisk is down! Khoram reaches the lift and spots an alien in the room above, blasting in the leg. Rising up squad 2 forms around the upper door. Tamren follows behind readying a stun launcher.

New turn. Uh o! Tanglebones is under alien control! He turns and shoots Vector and Dr Awkward! Vector is unhurt, but the Doctor is out! Rat Boy draws his sidearm and hits Tanglebones 3 times in the head! The armour holds, and the hits only raise sparks.

New turn. Those hits to the brain seem to have shook some sense into Tanglebones because he just started to panic. Upstairs Tamren rounds a corner and comes face to face with a sectoid leader! Blasting him in the face with a stunbomb he downs Tanglebone's tormentor. UFO Secure.

Mission Accomplished. 7 aliens neutralized. 1 sectoid leader captured. We lost Dr Awkward :(. While the UFO was a wreck, the bridge was intact and we salvaged 8 nav consoles and 70 units of metal. In light of the up-armouring of XCOM personnel Rat Boy will be authorized to use whatever weapon he has on hand to take care of rogue agents. Reserving his Revolver for other targets.

New turn. Uh o! Tanglebones is under alien control! He turns and shoots Vector and Dr Awkward! Vector is unhurt, but the Doctor is out! Rat Boy draws his sidearm and hits Tanglebones 3 times in the head!

New turn. Those hits to the brain seem to have shook some sense into Tanglebones because he just started to panic. Upstairs Tamren rounds a corner and comes face to face with a sectoid leader! Blasting him in the face with a stunbomb he downs Tanglebone's tormentor. UFO Secure.

If you need a rookie, you can throw me into the mix for the fun of it. I can be the FNG who opens the door or goes around the corner first. That's how I roll.

Tamren wrote:

A stone fence blocks his shot, so the first man off the bird, Vega, slides off the ramp and fires a shot from his heavy cannon. Miss.

Tamren wrote:

The first to open fire is Vega back at the landing gear. His first shot almost makes it, but hits an apple tree short of the target. His second shot is worse and hits a nearby fence, filling Quintin's ass with splinters and shrapnel, whups.

I probably forgot to mention that by roll I mean after a glass of gin and tonic. And by glass, I mean that I used the same glass all night. It's all good though. The alcohol fights off the mind control so I don't have Rat Boy come knocking.

The first to open fire is Vega back at the landing gear. His first shot almost makes it, but hits an apple tree short of the target. His second shot is worse and hits a nearby fence, filling Quintin's ass with splinters and shrapnel, whups.

This makes me happy.

NathanialG wrote:

I can only assume that when the antichrist arrives he will be left handed, Australian, and attempting to steal our womenfolk.

Its a bit rough around the edges and such. But as a game its pretty good. The creators put in a staggering amount of detail in the UFOpedia. Some articles, like the history of the world cover almost 5 pages.

Its a bit rough around the edges and such. But as a game its pretty good. The creators put in a staggering amount of detail in the UFOpedia. Some articles, like the history of the world cover almost 5 pages.

I've been tooling around with it as well. Seriously, if it had destructible terrain, IMO, it'd dethrone x-com. Well worth a play though.

If you do check out Alien Invasion I would suggest playing it on easy. I tried my first game on normal and it was just too hard. Well, not hard per se, but very busy. There were so many missions that I think I had captured my 8th UFO by the time my scientists puttered their way into developing laser pistols. And it would be another 90 hours of workshop time before I could use any of them.

I started again on easy and I am now settling into a more familiar pattern. 1 or 2 missions a week. UFO sightings every week or so. New tech developments arrive between missions. It just fits better with what I think of the strategic portion of the game.

For missions I would suggest turning off realtime lighting, bump contrast up slightly, bump gamma up a bit and raise the brightness. Otherwise you will find it almost impossible to see things in dark buildings and night missions.

New mission. A couple days after the previous one we detected two battleships over north america. One landed in Vancouver and the other in Washington. Team meat grinder is headed for Vancouver. Our interceptors are no match for a battleship so we will have to let the other one go. As Dr Awkward is down we will be bringing back Judge as Judge II to fill in the teams.

Mission begins. Right off the ramp Nihilo spots a floater to the east and takes it down with ease. Next Vega drops off to the west and spots a floater and a reaper. After 4 shots he is unable to hit the floater, so Khoram steps in with his autocannon to finish it off. Everyone off the ramp shoots at the reaper in succession but its tough and we are unable to take it out.

New turn. Vector, Khoram and Feeank all open fire on the reaper. After the fireworks I'm not sure who got the final hit. We advance north towards the lift. Quintin rounds a corner and spots a floater, takes one shot but its a miss. Nihilo rolls around the corner as well but can't get a hit. The rest of the squad led by Tamren prepare to breach the UFO.

New turn. Quinting tries to hit that same floater but misses twice. Finally Nihilo blasts the floater in the chest and the area is secure. Now for the UFO... First to breach is Tanglebones! He opens the door to find a floater with his back turned and guns him down. As he drops to the floor a blaster launcher falls out of his hands. Almost got us all wiped out there! Next inside is Tamren. He spots a floater on the level above and hits him with a stun ball. No effect, so he opens fire with his laser pistol and downs the floater on his 5th shot! Third up is Khoram who rises to the second level and downs a floater in a hail of autocannon fire. Taking some return fire to the chin his armour holds and Khoram is unhurt! No further contacts.

New turn. Feeank checks his motion scanner and gets contacts to the east and south. We spread out a bit searching the rooms but find nothing yet. Scanners detect all movement but not what level the object sits on. So its hard to translate the scans. Quintin and Tamren rise to floor 3 while everyone else begins to sweep the second floor. Peeking out a door Tamren finds nothing but Quintin on the other side spots a floater. He misses once before ducking back inside.

New turn. We sweep the second floor but find nothing. Up top Quintin rounds a corner but the floater has moved. Tamren flanks from the other side and surprises the floater from behind, taking it out with his laser pistol. Khoram on the south side gets ready to breach the command room.

New turn. Khoram bursts through the door and comes face to face with the floater leader! Opening fire with his autocannon the entire room is wracked with explosions as the shells and the various consoles erupt in smoke. The floater is obliterated but Khoram's armour deflects it all.

New turns. I then spent the next 4 turns searching for one last floater. We swept every room of the UFO before finally finding an unarmed floater sitting in the elevator on the ground floor. Where the heck did he come from? Rat boy took him out. UFO secure.

Mission Accomplished. Only 10 aliens were inside the battleship and we managed to get the jump on them all. I'm beginning to wonder if our game got affected by the difficulty bug. Total score 611.

Thanks to the abundant elerium brought back for this mission I am beginning production of power armour for everyone. Whats better is that we also have flying armour coming down the pipe. At 6 metal and 15 elerium each however the flying suits are very expensive and were going to have to work hard to get them for everyone.